Defects in bone structure arise in a variety of circumstances, such as trauma, disease, and surgery. There is a need for effective repair of bone defects in various surgical fields, including maxillo-craniofacial, periodontics, and orthopedics. Numerous natural and synthetic materials and compositions have been used to stimulate healing at the site of a bone defect. As with compositions used to repair other types of tissue, the biological and mechanical properties of a bone repair material are critical in determining the effectiveness and suitability of the material in any particular application.
After blood, bone is the second most commonly transplanted material. Autologous cancellous bone has long been considered the most effective bone repair material, since it is both osteoinductive and non-immunogenic. However, adequate quantities of autologous cancellous bone are not available under all circumstances, and donor site morbidity and trauma are serious drawbacks to this approach. The use of allograft bone avoids the problem of creating a second surgical site in the patient, but suffers from some disadvantages of its own. For instance, allograft bone typically has a lower osteogenic capacity than autograft bone, a higher resorption rate, creates less revascularization at the site of the bone defect, and typically results in a greater immunogenic response. The transfer of certain diseases is also a danger when using allografts.
To avoid the problems associated with autograft and allograft bone, considerable research has been conducted in the area of synthetic bone substitute materials that can be used in lieu of natural bone. For example, various compositions and materials comprising demineralized bone matrix, calcium phosphate, and calcium sulfate have been proposed.
Cements comprising calcium sulfate have a long history of use as bone graft substitutes. Modern surgical grade calcium sulfate cements offer high initial strength, good handling properties, and are consistently replaced by bone in many applications. However, calcium sulfate cements are characterized by relatively rapid resorption by the body, which can be undesirable in certain applications.
Hydroxyapatite is one of the most commonly used calcium phosphates in bone graft materials. Its structure is similar to the mineral phase of bone and it exhibits excellent biocompatibility. However, hydroxyapatite has an extremely slow resorption rate that may be unsuitable in certain applications. Other calcium phosphate materials have also been used in the art, such as β-tricalcium phosphate, which exhibits a faster resorption rate than hydroxyapatite, but has less mechanical strength. Certain calcium phosphate materials that set in situ have also been attempted, such as mixtures of tetracalcium phosphate and dicalcium phosphate anhydrate or dihydrate, which react to form hydroxyapatite when mixed with an aqueous solution.
The presently available synthetic bone repair materials do not present ideal functional characteristics for all bone graft applications. As noted above, some compositions exhibit a resorption rate that is either too slow or too rapid. Further, many bone graft cements are difficult to implant because they fail to set or cannot be injected. Other drawbacks are inadequate strength and difficulty in adding biologically active substances for controlled release. For these reasons, there remains a need in the art for bone graft cement compositions that combine a desirable resorption rate with high mechanical strength, ease of handling, and osteoconductivity.